Dana Bash Getting Harassed By Pro-Palestinian Protestors is Flat Out Anti-Semitism

AP Photo/Andrew Harnik

Pro-Palestinian protestors interrupted CNN’s Dana Bash during an otherwise pedestrian book reading at a Washington, D.C. bookstore Thursday. It was just another example of protestors harassing a CNN anchor over their coverage of the Israel-Hamas war, which comes after multiple protests at Jake Tapper’s home, where even his children were subjected to verbal abuse.

The Oct. 7 terror attack by Hamas and the ensuing war on Gaza by Israel have presented a tremendous challenge for journalists. Few, if any, have covered the story perfectly. Still, for some reason, Dana Bash and Jake Tapper, both Jewish Americans, have been singled out for private attacks. Huh, I wonder why that is?

To suggest that the protestors are openly anti-semitic is not just something based on intuition. The rhetoric spewed by these misinformed protestors provides all the evidence one needs. During Bash’s book reading, a masked protestor accused the CNN anchor of seeking millions from the pro-Israel lobbying organization AIPAC. Here’s how Mediaite’s Zachary Leeman reported the exchange:

At the Politics and Prose bookstore, Bash was joined by Kara Swisher and was eventually accused of everything from being a “killer” to taking “millions from Zionists” to tell lies on air.

“After World War II, every single journalist that was complicit in their war that was complicit in their war crimes was charged. You belong behind bars!” a woman wearing a mask told Bash.

The woman claimed there has “never been a war” and called Israel’s strikes on Gaza “ethnic cleansing.” She called Bash, who is Jewish, “complicit” in this genocide.

“I came here to ask her why she’s telling lies on public air every single day,” the woman said.

In edited footage posted to social media, the woman does not mention any specific lies or reports from Bash she has issues with.

“Every time she lies, a neighborhood in Gaza dies. She is killing people,” the woman said, adding, “You are a killer!”

To her credit, Bash remained calm throughout the confrontation, and a fellow attendee asked the protestor to remove her mask in a poignant moment. If the protester is proud of her harassment of Bash, why does she feel the need to hide her identity?

“Let’s be clear on what’s happening here: A masked person yells at a Jewish CNN journalist that she is taking “millions” from AIPAC, using the money to buy her house(!),” noted The Atlantic‘s Yair Rosenberg on social media. “This is antisemitic mad-libs, using Israel as a flimsy pretext to try and hound Jews out of the public square.”

Tapper also pointed out the clear dynamic at play on social media, writing, “These protestors target Dana at her home and this event because she’s Jewish,” before simply explaining, “This harassment is antisemitism.”

Tapper’s assessment is 100% accurate — and the product of his firsthand experience. Misguided protestors have shown up at his DC-area home and even hectored his children about how their father was somehow a “war criminal” for how he has covered the war.

The tortured irony is that both Bash and Tapper have covered this complex story in an unsatisfying manner to partisans on either side. And they have done so with a brave level of moral clarity that calls out atrocities for what they are — atrocities.

One of the protestors that interrupted Bash’s reading cited a 2023 segment in which the CNN anchor insisted to Rep. Pramila Jayapal that the IDF wasn’t raping Palestinians like Hamas terrorists has done to civilians. In the following year, members of the IDF were alleged to have employed the same brutal tactic, but that was well after Bash’s interview with Jayapal. Journalists can only work with the facts they have at a given time.

Critics of Bash often point to her segment from May covering college campus protests against Israel, which doesn’t look great with the benefit of hindsight. But for this one example, there are many more in which she has confronted Israeli officials for the dire situation in Gaza, most notably her direct grilling of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for his role and responsibility in the ongoing conflict and humanitarian crisis. She pressed the Israeli Ambassador to the US, Michael Herzog, on the deaths of Palestinian civilians. She also challenged Israel’s UN ambassador, Gilad Erdan, when he argued there was no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

As for Tapper, he has condemned the brutality of Israel’s war in Gaza too many times to count. He pressed an IDF spokesperson on Palestinian casualties. He grilled the Israeli ambassador for holding all 2.3 million Palestinians accountable for the brutal attacks of Hamas. He even blamed key members of Netanyahu’s cabinet for “throwing fire on the flames” of the deadly conflict for political gain. There are dozens more examples just like these.

There are also dozens of other cable news anchors and hosts that live in Washington, D.C., and have covered this story in the same manner that Bash and Tapper have. Yet none of them have had to deal with the same harassment Bash and Tapper — who, again, both just happen to be Jewish — have.

No one would bat an eye if these protesters appeared outside of CNN’s DC headquarters. These protestors sought to confront Tapper and Bash at their homes and in public settings because they wanted to send a threatening message not just to them but to Jews everywhere.

It’s long past time to call out this naked anti-semitism for what it is.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.